In Anne Arundel Police search for suspect in fatal...

Regional Digest

HANOVER - Police were searching yesterday for a 32-year- old Severn man charged in the stabbing death of a man whose body was found last week at an Anne Arundel County business park.

James Edward Belcher of the 1800 block of Arwell Court was charged in a warrant with first-degree murder in the stabbing death of Michael Todd Jefferson Jr., 22, also of the 1800 block of Arwell Court, Anne Arundel County police said yesterday.

Jefferson was found dead in the parking lot of the Commons Corporate Center about 7:40 a.m. Thursday by an employee at the business park, which is in Hanover, off Dorsey Road on New Ridge Road. Jefferson was last seen about 10 p.m. Wednesday near his home in the Pioneer City community, police said. He suffered stab wounds throughout his body, police said.

Belcher, described by authorities as armed and dangerous, is black, about 6 feet tall and weighs 200 pounds. Police said he drives a 1996 burgundy four-door Chrysler LHS with Maryland tags JNV150. Anyone with information about his whereabouts is asked to call 911 or county police at 410-222-8610.

Two teen-agers injured in gunfight on city street

ANNAPOLIS - A gunfight that broke out early yesterday in Annapolis between occupants of a car and pedestrians sent two teen-agers to the hospital, police reported.

Eugene Martin, 19, and Mario Kaskins, 19, both of Annapolis, were taken to Anne Arundel Medical Center for treatment of injuries suffered in the shooting, which occurred shortly after midnight in the 1800 block of Bowman Court, Annapolis police said. Martin was shot in the arm and Kaskins was shot in the ankle, police said.

Several vehicles and apartments were struck by stray bullets. Police were investigating the incident yesterday. Officials knew of no motive for the shooting and had made no arrests last night.

In Baltimore City

Protesters angry with city block street with debris

A group of Waverly residents and members of the group ACORN blocked Harford Road next to Clifton Park for about 25 minutes yesterday with piles of debris that they said had been dumped in a neighborhood lot that the city had failed to clean.

Police closed the street between Gorsuch Avenue and Montpelier Street as city public works crews hauled away old tires, broken windows and dilapidated furniture, while a handful of protesters complained that their calls for the city to crack down on illegal dumping had gone unheeded.

Public works officials said yesterday's protest was the first notice they had of the problem, but the protesters with Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now disputed that. "We've been calling for months," said Bernard Bush, who lives in the 1700 block of Gorsuch Ave.

Police said no arrests were made.

In Allegany County

W.Va. man, 47, is killed in pickup truck accident

OLDTOWN - A 47-year-old West Virginia man was killed Friday night when his pickup truck struck an embankment on a highway in Allegany County, authorities said.

Delmas Clyde Cowgill, of Paw Paw, W.Va., was driving a 1988 Dodge Power Ram pickup truck east on Route 51, south of Oldtown, about 6 p.m. when the vehicle left the road, crossed the westbound lane and struck the embankment, Maryland State Police reported.